Warhammer-Empire.com

The Empire is a large and diverse nation, home not only to men but to Dwarfs, Halflings, Ogres and more. Though many great rivers run through the Empire the only coastline is to be found in the Grand Barony of Nordland. It is here, in Nordland, that the brave men of the northern Empire fight daily to keep their nation free from marine invaders.

Ostensibly one of the Empire's poorer provinces the fortunes of Nordland are not quite as they seem. The Coastal Road running to Marienburg brings much gold into Nordland by way of wary merchants not willing to brave the Drakwald. Countless tollbooths straddle this thoroughfare and each toll-keeper will have his due. Hundreds of Imperial Crowns are collected each day along the Coastal Road, though precious few of them seem to make it to the Imperial tax collectors.

It is this money that keeps Nordland, and thus the Empire, safe. With it Count Gausser maintains the large state army of Nordland as well as employing numerous mercenaries, acquiring the latest technology from the Imperial School of Engineers and keeping up his dues with the Colleges of Magic. As the Nordlanders often fight those tainted by Chaos the Church of Sigmar is only too happy to lend its aid to the troops of Nordland.

Once more I am taking part in a play by post Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay game and once again it has ignited my passion for Warhammer. Like the last time we started playing WFRP I have been inspired to start an Empire army. However, unlike last time, I have managed to get a cracking deal on eBay for a decent sized army, mostly still on the sprues, comprising of the lovely 6th Ed. minis.

I spent this afternoon cleaning up some assembled Handgunners as well as some Pirazzo's Lost Legion, which I intend on using as crossbowmen. I've had the Legionnaries since I first started in this hobby over a decade ago, and so the little paint that is on them was applied with gumption and good intentions but no skill. My skill hasn't improved much since then, so this army will primarily be getting dipped. Not dunked, but washed with Army Painter's Strong Tone. This will allow me to have a nice looking army that I can play with, as playing with unpainted minis is unconscionable.

Fernando Pirazzo had once thought he would never live to see his beloved Tilea again. He had signed up on an expedition to Lustria with some merchants from Tobaro. It was here that he and his Legionnaire's quickly learned to fight with a mixture of crossbows and pikes, the surest defence against the vicious denizens of that benighted continent. Now in the employ of Count Gausser the Lost Legion has discarded their pikes in favour of being exclusively armed with crossbows, reasoning that they are better suited to naval warfare. Once more Fernando wonders if he will ever return home to Tilea.

Now I'm sure a lot of people only post fluff with their models once they're fully painted, but as I only started working on them today that's not possible. That, and I have an overactive imagination and love writing these little snippets even if they don't get read. I know I'm guilty of just flicking through logs for pictures at times. I'm afraid the pictures aren't the best as it was taken with my HTC Desire, which takes lovely distance shots but doesn't have a macro function for closer up work. I do however have a proper camera, it is just in need of batteries currently.



These look rather shiny as they had just been washed to remove any grease and much that they've accumulated over the last decade. It was quite a bit, let me tell you! The plan with these is to paint them in a scheme similar to the one shown on the GW website, but using blue and yellow as spot colours on sashes and feathers etc. In the army they will simply be fielded as Crossbowmen, though whether they will have the Full Command or not is currently up in the air. They will be getting a banner made for them, but I'm not sure what is going on there yet.

Handgunners form an important part of the army of Nordland, the damage they can do to invaders and their ships in invaluable. Whilst not as powerful as some of the larger contraptions from the Imperial College of Engineers the handgun does a mighty service to the safety and security of Nordland.



Again, not the best picture I'm afraid, but it gets the idea across. I'm a big fan of these 6th Ed. plastics, they're just more my cup of tea than the newer State Troop plastics. That isn't to say that the new plastics won't be integrated at some point, but for I'm going to try to stick to 6th Ed. as far as possible.

Now, just for funzies, is a comparison shot between a Lost Legionnaire and a Handgunner. There must be something in the water in Nordland as the Hadgunner is a good bit bigger than the Tilean, either that or Tileans are just midgets.



Below is the list of all the models I have currently to build and paint, colour coded to show status.

Red - Unbuilt
Blue - Built
Orange - Painting in Progress
Green  - Complete

Warrior Priests of Sigmar - w. Great Weapon
Grey Wizard
Amber Wizard
Jade Wizard
Engineer
10 Handgunners
Captain on Foot
20 Swordsmen
Templar Grand Master
Warrior Priest of Sigmar - w. Two Hand Weapons
20 Spearmen
20 Handgunners
20 Free Company
2 Cannon/Mortar
6 Pistoliers
8 Knights

Despite the name, they look like characterful models.  I'd say run them as Bulls - it will probably be cheaper from a points perspective, and an ogre sergeant isn't a slouch.  Bull charge is also nice - with 6 ogres, you can run 3x2 and get those 3, S5 impact hits without losing any attacks.  Just my 2 cents.

I'm looking forward to seeing some paint on Golgfag and his boys...

So, eine kleine pictorial update and another apology for the length of time between updates.

First things first, things are going fantastically well in my new job - I was taken on a temporary contract to cover maternity leave and I've now been offered a permanent job and have been promoted too. I have more responsibilities now and its the first step on the ladder to management, which is cracking! Also as I work in one of our UK stores and therefore The Mother Ship it'd be quite easy for me to transfer to one of our overseas stores, and working in North America somewhere quite tickles my fancy.

With the increasing responsibilities at work comes more hours in work, so less time for hobby but more pennies come payday. Some good, some bad there. Things in the personal side have been odd too, the girl I was sort of seeing now seems to be moving back to getting with her ex-partner which is odd. Once more I turn to the one constant in my life, this hobby and the community around it which has gotten me through some hard times in the past.

So with all that said I suppose you'd like to see some pictures, eh? Not a huge update but it shows that work has happened on this army. We're currently are organising a big Storm of Magic game for mid-August so I need to get 3,000 points of these built by then.

So in the hobby time I've managed to sneak in over the last week I've managed to get a unit of ten Pistoliers cleaned up and assembled. Like a lot of the army these are the older 6th Edition models, something I lusted over as a teenager and now can afford. They're teeny tiny metal men, on teeny tiny horses but I love these models.



To the left of the Pistoliers you can see a wee hunched figure with moose antlers on its bonce - that is a now out of production i-Kore Shaman that I got in a deal off of the lovely Boreas. Indeed, many of the above pictured Pistoliers came from Papendrecht with the Shaman. The plan with the Shaman is to use him as an Amber Wizard in friendly games in the local club, whereas being a non-GW mini I can't use him in the local store to play.



Apologies for the images being a bit fuzzy, I've lent my camera to a friend travelling around Europe so have been using my HTC Desire. It takes good pictures, the majority of those in this log were taken with it, it just lacks the macro function. Thinking of buying a new camera in the near future though as I want a good camera for taking pictures of interesting things like old churches etc.

yep , last time i was into WH, was in 1995/6 when i was 15/16,

then i got back into it aged 30 lol

I agree , i am spending about £50 a week on warhammer which would have been unthinkable when i was younger!

I also seem to get tied up in daily long conference calls with work, from my home office and have developed this amazing ability to paint and talk / listen , using a headset to free up my arms!

Thanks Stolzeuhu, I've been thinking on trying to do something different with the Amber Wizard's staff though I'm not sure which route to go down currently. Debating with trimming the spear parts off and making it a bit more staff-like from there or completely removing it and making a brand new staff. Of course, as everyone knows a wizard's staff has a knob on the end, so I need at least that.

A bit of a cheeky update this time around, it features painted models but I've not painted them myself. I've gotten my mitts on some very old Flagellants with some very old paint on them, as well as some slightly newer Flagellants with some slightly newer paint on them. The ancient Flagellants will most definitely be getting stripped down then re-painted, but the newer ones may stay as they are but with a little bit of a touch up. Sharp eyed viewers may spot Wilhelm Hasburg rocking around with the purple Flagellants, he will no doubt end becoming another Warrior Priest for the army, he is one already after all.